Adsorption Equilibrium and Kinetics of Egg-White Proteins on Immobilized Metal Ion Affinity Gels for Designing Fractionation

Designing an Immobilized Metal ion Affinity (IMA) chromatographic process on large scale demands a thorough understanding to be developed regarding the adsorption behaviour of proteins on metal loaded IMA (IMA-M(II)) gels and the characteristic adsorption parameters to be evaluated. This research investigation illustrates the significance of these aspects for the proposed fractionation of chicken egg-white proteins on these gels. Consequently, a systematic investigation of the adsorption characteristics of three chicken egg-white proteins viz., ovalbumin, conalbumin and lysozyme on Cu(II) and Ni(II) loaded IMA gels, iminodiacetate (IDA) and tris(2-aminoethyl)amine (TREN), has been undertaken. These gels differ in their selectivity towards the proteins of interest under the identical sets of experimental conditions. While TREN-Ni(II) was selective only for lysozyme, IDA-Cu(II), IDA-Ni(II) and TREN-Cu(II) showed varying affinities for all the three proteins. The equilibrium and kinetic data were analysed using various theoretical models and adsorption parameters were quantified. On the basis of these investigations, various strategies have been proposed for the efficient large-scale fractionation of chicken egg-white proteins on these gels.     

Benzoxazine-bismaleimide blends: Curing and thermal properties

A blend of bisphenol A based benzoxazine (Bz-A) and a bismaleimide (2,2-bis[4(4-maleimidophenoxy) phenyl] propane (BMI), was thermally polymerised in varying proportions and their cure and thermal characteristics were investigated. The differential scanning calorimetric analysis, supplemented by rheology confirmed a lowering of the cure temperature of BMI in the blend implying catalysis of the maleimide polymerisation by benzoxazine. FTIR studies provided evidences for the H-bonding between carbonyl group of BMI and -OH group of polybenzoxazine in the cured matrix. The cured matrix manifested a dual phase behaviour in SEM and DMTA with the minor phase constituted by polybenzoxazine dispersed in an interpenetrating polymer network (IPN) of polybenzoxazine and cured BMI. The IPN possessed improved thermal stability over the constituent polybenzoxazine. A benzoxazine monomer possessing allyl functional groups, 2,2′-bis(8-allyl-3-phenyl-3,4-dihydro-2H-1,3-benzoxazinyl) propane (Bz-allyl) was reactively blended with the same bismaleimide in varying stoichiometric ratios (Bz-allyl/BMI), where the curing involved mainly Alder-ene reaction between allyl- and maleimides groups and ring-opening polymerisation of benzoxazine. The rheological analysis showed the absence of catalytic polymerisation of BMI in this case. The overall processing temperature was lowered in the blend owing to the co-reaction of the two systems to form a single-phase matrix. The cured resins of both Bz-A/BMI and Bz-allyl/BMI blends exhibited better thermal stability than the respective polybenzoxazines. The T_g of the IPN was significantly improved over that of polybenzoxazine (Bz-A). However, the co-reaction resulted in a marginal decrease in the T_g of the system in comparison to the polybenzoxazine (Bz-allyl).     

Linear and nonlinear substructured Restricted Additive Schwarz iterations and preconditioning

Iterative substructuring Domain Decomposition (DD) methods have been extensively studied, and they are usually associated with nonoverlapping decompositions. It is less known that classical overlapping DD methods can also be formulated in substructured form, i.e., as iterative methods acting on variables defined exclusively on the interfaces of the overlapping domain decomposition. We call such formulations substructured domain decomposition methods. We introduce here a substructured version of Restricted Additive Schwarz (RAS) which we call SRAS. We show that RAS and SRAS are equivalent when used as iterative solvers, as they produce the same iterates, while they are substantially different when used as preconditioners for GMRES. We link the volume and substructured Krylov spaces and show that the iterates are different by deriving the least squares problems solved at each GMRES iteration. When used as iterative solvers, SRAS presents computational advantages over RAS, as it avoids computations with matrices and vectors at the volume level. When used as preconditioners, SRAS has the further advantage of allowing GMRES to store smaller vectors and perform orthogonalization in a lower dimensional space. We then consider nonlinear problems, and we introduce SRASPEN (Substructured Restricted Additive Schwarz Preconditioned Exact Newton), where SRAS is used as a preconditioner for Newton’s method. In contrast to the linear case, we prove that Newton’s method applied to the preconditioned volume and substructured formulation produces the same iterates in the nonlinear case. Next, we introduce two-level versions of nonlinear SRAS and SRASPEN. Finally, we validate our theoretical results with numerical experiments.

     

Multipole plasmon resonances of submicron silver particles

Single crystal, silver particles of 215 +/- 10 nm size were synthesized in solution using the hydrogen reduction method and were characterized by UV-visible extinction spectroscopy and electron microscopy. The extinction spectra reveal the presence of higher order multipoles of the plasmon resonance, such as quadrupole, octupole, and hexadecapole, in addition to the dipole. The formation of higher order multipoles was continuously monitored during the particles growth. Mie extinction calculations were performed and are in good agreement with the measured extinction spectra. The frequency shift of all plasmon modes was measured as a function of the refractive index of the surrounding dielectric medium.     

Polarographic reduction behaviour of copper in the presence of 1-amino-3-methoxypropane and 2-dimethylaminoethanol

1-Amino-3-methoxypropane (3MPA) and 2-dimethylaminoethanol (DMAE) are potential volatile amines for boiler water treatment and were investigated for their complexation behaviour with copper. Their pK_b values were 3.67 and 4.52 at 25°C and they formed coloured complexes with absorption in the region of 644 and 510 nm, respectively. In the pH range 10–11, the Cu-3MPA complex exhibited stepwise reduction and [Cu(3MPA)₂]⁺ was identified, with a stability constant of 10^9.52. In the pH range 8–10.5, the Cu-DMAE complex exhibited 2e^? reduction and the species [Cu(DMAE)₂(OH)₂] was identified, with a stability constant of 10^20.39. A correlation between visible and ESR spectra and reduction behaviour was established.     

Novel chemical synthesis of polypyrrole thin film electrodes for supercapacitor application

Present investigation describes the cost-effective, novel and simple chemical synthesis of polypyrrole (PPy) thin films for supercapacitor application. These PPy films are characterized by different techniques such as X-ray diffraction (XRD), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The XRD pattern reveals the amorphous nature of PPy thin film, which is highly feasible for supercapacitors. Further, FTIR study confirms the formation of PPy. The surface morphological study exhibit the coverage of uniform and smooth morphology on thin film. The electrochemical supercapacitive properties of PPy thin films are evaluated using cyclic voltammetry (CV) in 0.5 M H₂SO₄ electrolyte, which exhibits the maximum specific capacitance of 329 Fg⁻¹ at the scan rate of 5 mV s⁻¹. Additionally, an equivalent series resistance (ESR) of PPy thin films is found to be 1.08 Ω using electrochemical impedance measurement.     

Bio-surfactant: a green and environmentally benign reaction medium for ligand-free Pd-catalyzed Mizoroki–Heck cross-coupling reaction in water

Transition Metal Chemistry - A simple and efficient protocol for the ligand-free Mizoroki–Heck coupling reaction of various aryl bromides with different olefins has been reported by using in...